Handy Smurf (Empath stories)
"Being born second isn't what bothers me. What does bother me is that Hefty has to smurf a big deal about being the firstborn. To me, being born the first doesn't make you the best. He can smurf bigger muscles, I can smurf better machines." Henry Forge "Handy" Smurf is a Smurf character who appears in the Empath: The Luckiest Smurf story series. History Handy was the son of Muscles Smurf, born as the twin brother of Hefty Smurf. While Hefty was named right after he was born for being a big and strong baby, Handy's name was simply from a careless comment about having a twin child being "handy" that got picked up by Tailor's father who sewed matching name sleepers for the children. (Their official birth names are Harold for Hefty and Henry for Handy.) Like most of his fellow Smurfs his age, he was raised by his parents until an unknown disease had claimed their lives, leaving him and his brothers Hefty and Grouchy in the care of Culliford Smurf, who eventually became known as Papa Smurf. The rest of his personal history at least in the present point of the story series is similar to that of his cartoon show counterpart up until around Seasons 5 and 6. About five years after Empath and Smurfette had married, Handy met his counterpart Gadget from Smurfette Island and married her, producing two sons. The couple formed Handy-Gadget Innovations, which specialized in developing new technologies for their fellow Smurfs. Handy lived for a total of 693 years, as did his brother Hefty, after which they were both laid to rest with their fellow Smurfs. Personality While sharing some similarities with his cartoon show counterpart, Handy finds himself constantly competing with his twin brother Hefty Smurf, proving that brains is better than muscle, not to mention that Hefty being born the first of the two doesn't make him the best. Although Handy is jealous of Empath and his abilities, he finds himself rather inspired by what Empath can do and builds machines that would allow his fellow Smurfs to do things similar to what Empath can do. Handy at one time fell in love with a mermaid named Marina when she lost consciousness swimming up the River Smurf in order to reach the Pool of Avalon to get lilyroot for her ailing father King Aquarius. However, because Handy could only live on land and Marina could only live in the sea, their relationship was difficult to maintain. Eventually, during an incident where she was captured by an undersea menace called the Leviathan, she fell in love with a Snorkelian named Dylan and thus her relationship with Handy ended at that point, though they still remained friends. Like all the other Smurfs in the village, Handy is heterosexual and strongly believes that only males and females should be united together in marriage, although he holds no hostility towards those of other sexual orientations unless they pose a problem toward him or others. Sometime after his return from the Smurfs' time-traveling adventures in The Lost Year, Handy was disgusted to hear from Empath that his Mirror Universe counterpart actually has a dating relationship with its Hefty. Handy does not like smoking or taking any kind of mood-altering substance other than drinking coffee and sarsaparilla ale, the latter of which his brother Hefty has a low tolerance for except for the non-alcoholic type. At one time Handy was addicted to the powerful magic of the Orb Of Euphoria that was given to Poet by Allura the witch, but after Empath helped break his addiction, Handy foreswore the use of any sort of magic for inspiration or helping him to work better or faster. In "Where The Wind Carries You", Handy was notably put off by Lazy's addiction to smoking herbs such as damiana, not wanting Lazy to come near him because he might get him high just by breathing on him. Role He is the village mechanic and inventor who is always on call to fix or build things, and he often tries to invent new things that can make the Smurf way of living easier, though most of those inventions either get abused or get out of control, requiring Handy to shut them down or to destroy them, which results in the village returning to their normal tried-and-true ways. Sometimes Handy gets carried away with his own inventions, such as the time that he developed a power driller and started drilling everything he got his hands on, including a cake mold that Smurfette intended to use for making a cake for Papa Smurf. In that instance, the Smurfs retaliated by turning Handy's power driller into a Handy Smurf butt-kicking machine. Handy was inspired by Empath's ability to fly using his telekinetic powers to come up with a way for himself to do the same. About five years before Empath's final return, Handy invented the Smurf plane, which he used to rescue Smurfette from Gargamel, though he ended up sacrificing it to stop Gargamel's flying invention which he used against the Smurf Village. Handy is the inventor of Clockwork Smurf, who became sentient and saved a young prince named Gerard from imprisonment by his aunt Imperia, who sought to claim her nephew's rightful place on the throne. After Imperia was cast away and Gerard was coronated king, Clockwork Smurf became his adviser. Handy later built a companion for Clockwork Smurf named Clockwork Smurfette, and around the time of Empath's wedding he discovered that the two had built for themselves a child named Baby Clockwork, in essence making Handy a "grandfather". At Empath and Smurfette's wedding, Handy, Hefty, and Duncan were given the usher positions. In the alternate timeline story "Hefty, The Luckiest Smurf", he was given the position of the best man at Hefty and Smurfette's wedding. Relationships * Empath is his friend and inspiration for his inventions. * Papa Smurf is his adopted father, whom he seeks to please in everything he does. * Smurfette was his love interest before he met Marina. * Hefty is his brother and is treated as both a friendly rival and a complementary equal. While they both have the same birthday since they are twins, Greedy bakes separate cakes for both Hefty and Handy. * Carpenter, Mason, and Smithy are his occasional co-workers, for whom he has nothing but praise for their individual talents in construction. * Marina was his girlfriend, up until she met Dylan. * Clockwork Smurf is treated as a son by Handy, which partly explains how he felt when he first saw and held Baby Clockwork Smurf in his arms at the time of Empath and Smurfette's wedding. * Gadget is his Smurfette counterpart on Smurfette Island whom he likes to collaborate with on various building projects and inventions. He ended up giving his special necklace, the Heart Of The Ocean, to her when he proposed marriage to her years after his relationship with Marina ended. * Gizmo and Widget are his two children through his wife Gadget Smurfette. He humorously refers to them respectively as "Gee" and "Whiz". Abilities Handy Smurf is a master craftsman who tends to be very resourceful, able to turn anything he can get his hands on into an invention. He is also very skilled in mathematics. Clothing And Appearance Originally Handy wore a white Smurf hat with a visor and white overalls, but a year after Empath's final return to the Smurf Village from Psychelia in the story "Monkey On Your Smurf", he switched to wearing blue overalls, similar to his current comic book counterpart. Sometime after marrying his wife Gadget, Handy switched to wearing all blue. In his later adult years, Handy would wear an orange moustache and a face full of stubble. His physique as a Smurf is considered slim, mostly because he keeps himself in shape with his constant work. Notes * Hefty and Handy's relationship as being twin brothers in the EMPATH story series is supposed to reflect that of the Biblical twins Esau and Jacob, with Hefty representing Esau and Handy representing Jacob. * As an infant, Handy builds a toy that resembles Fred Flintstone's automobile. * In mainstream Smurfs media, Handy would wear the blue overalls and the visored hat together in the 2011 Smurfs movie and The Smurfs: A Christmas Carol. * In "Handy's Flying Lessons", Handy is the composite of himself and the comic book character Flying Smurf, who in "The Flying Smurf" and "The Aerosmurf" sought for a way to fly. Trivia * Handy is the team captain of the West Smurfs in the first Smurfic Games Tournament. * Handy was the second Smurf of his generation to experience the "Smurfette dream", following his brother Hefty -- although it may actually be the case that he experienced it at the same time as Hefty and is only the second Smurf to be recorded in the story "I Dream Of Smurfette" as having experienced it following Hefty. * Handy's birth name Henry was taken from Henry Ford, the inventor of the automobile, but modified to Forge due to the author's dislike of the inventor's anti-Semitism. * The current profile images are based on Numbuh 404's pose for Hero Smurf from the HERO: The Guardian Smurf story series. * His signature song is "Handy" by "Weird Al" Yankovic. Voice Actor(s) He would most likely be voiced by Jensen Ackles, who was the voice of Gibson from the videogame TRON: Evolution for the Playstation 3 and Xbox 360. Another likely candidate is Troy Baker, who was the voice of Booker DeWitt from Bioshock Infinite. See Also * Handy Smurf's inventions * Reporter's Inside Stories: An Interview With Handy Category:Empath the Luckiest Smurf characters Category:Smurfs Category:Males Category:Builders Category:Empath's generation Smurfs Category:Smurf Village residents Category:Americus clan Smurfs Category:VicGeorge2K9's articles Category:Heterosexual characters Category:Nature worshipers Category:Hefty's family members Category:Handy's family members Category:Grouchy's family members Category:Multiple media universe imports